Infants and other incontinent individuals wear disposable absorbent articles to receive and contain urine and other bodily exudates. Absorbent articles having fixed sides have been popular for use in adult incontinence articles and children's toilet-training articles because it is desirable to have an absorbent article which is very garment-like in appearance and feel. (As used herein, "articles having fixed sides" refer to disposable articles such as adult incontinence briefs and training pants which are provided to the consumer in a pant-like configuration. Thus, the articles generally have the front and rear portions joined together to form a waist hoop and leg holes. This is unlike conventional diapers which are provided to the consumer with the front and rear portions unjoined.) For adults, the garment-like appearance and feel can help reduce any embarrassment associated with the use of incontinence articles. For children, especially in their toilet training stage, the garment-like feel and appearance can help the child distinguish the article, such as training pants, from a diaper and can help the child adjust to cloth undergarments.
One example of a commercially available disposable training pant is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 5,246,433 entitled "Elasticized Disposable Training Pant and Method of Making the Same", issued to Hasse et al. on Sep. 21, 1993. Although this training pant has been a commercial success, it still suffers because it includes seams joining the front and rear portions which are not garment-like in appearance. Such seams are often constructed by positioning the lateral edges of the front and rear portions of the article in a face-to-face relationship with one another and then gluing, sewing, heat sealing, pressure bonding or ultrasonically sealing the edges to form flanges or fin seams. The flanges or fins are unsightly if located on the outwardly facing surface of the article or irritating to the wearer if located on the inward surface. Thus, attempts have been made to reduce the outwardly or inwardly extending portions of the flanges of fin seams. However, in so doing the process for making the seams generally becomes more complex and costly and may reduce the strength of the bond.
Thus, it would be advantageous to be able to provide a flangeless seam that can be constructed economically. It would also be advantageous to provide a flangeless seam that could be produces on machinery that is very similar to that already in place. Further, it would be advantageous to reduce the amount of material that is needed to produce an aesthetically pleasing seam that is strong enough to hold together the front and rear portions of a disposable absorbent article.